Engineering ingenuity and entrepreneurial smarts proved a winning combination for a team of UNH seniors whose project took a top prize at a recent national environmental design competition. The team — three business entrepreneurship majors from the Paul College of Business and Economics and two mechanical engineering majors from the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, led by Paul College professor Jeff Sohl — won the INTEL Innovation award for the top project in the 24th annual Environmental Design Contest at New Mexico State University earlier this month.

The Granite State Ventures team (L-R: Daniel Crowley, Professor Jeffrey Sohl, Bridget Fay, Cole Jaillet, Andrew Nelligan, Jeffrey Moore) and their award-winning TiltOne power point tracking system for solar panels. Credit: Lisa Nugent, University of New Hampshire.

“We were the only team there with business as well as engineering majors,” said Cole Jaillet, an entrepreneurship and marketing major, explaining their winning edge. “The engineers created this cool product, but it was up to us business majors to make it feasible.” Calling themselves Granite State Ventures, the UNH team was one of 19 competing.

The contest, hosted by the Waste Management Education and Research Consortium (WERC), challenges undergraduates from around the U.S. to develop technological solutions to one of five real-world environmental challenges. The UNH team chose to tackle an economic obstacle to solar panels: The energy “cost” of the system that moves them to track the sun during the day.

Called power point tracking systems, these systems draw energy generated by the solar panels to power the motor, making them inefficient. Further, solar panels lose energy during the day due to overheating. The engineers on the team, Jeffrey Moore and Andrew Nelligan, addressed both inefficiencies by utilizing thermoelectric generators to harness that excess heat for the energy that swivels the panels to follow the sun at an optimal angle as it passes through the sky.

“We created a system that’s really going to take care of a real problem,” said entrepreneurship and marketing major Daniel Crowley. Their system, which they call TiltOne, harnesses 22 percent more energy than traditional systems, they said.

While the engineers solved the technical problem and created a prototype of their design, the entrepreneurs — Jaillet, Crowley, and marketing and entrepreneurship major Bridget Fay — applied their business acumen to make TiltOne a success in the marketplace.

Scanning the landscape of their potential market — commercial facilities that might use rooftop solar panels — Granite State Ventures learned that less than one percent of the nation’s five million commercial buildings use solar panels, despite the fact that “the vast majority of commercial buildings are friendly to solar power,” said Moore.

The students’ marketing plan addressed pricing, regulatory issues and incentives, payback period, and competition. With approximately 4.9 million buildings in their market share and a solar market that’s expected to grow revenues by 8 percent in 2014 alone, TiltOne seemed poised for success.

The judges — experts from industry and government — agreed. “This award proves that the project works,” said Jaillet.

Integrating significant business expertise into an environmental engineering challenge distinguished Granite State Ventures to the judges, the students say. It also gave them real-world experience they might have missed had they not worked across disciplines.

“It reflects well on you. It’s what you deal with out in the workplace,” said Crowley.

“It’s a great talking point during interviews,” Fay added. The students credit UNH and their faculty mentors, mechanical engineering professors Barbaros Celikkol and Brad Kinsey in addition to Sohl, for encouraging this interdisciplinary effort. “The only barriers were scheduling and the distance between the Paul College and Kingsbury,” Fay said.

“I believe this is a tribute to our ability at UNH to successfully work across disciplines. I look forward to continuing to offer unique interdisciplinary activities such as this to our students in the future,” said Sohl, who is the director of UNH’s Center for Venture Research.

“Jeff Sohl’s the man,” Fay added, noting that he treated the students like real entrepreneurs, encouraging them to act independently and make their own decisions. The students also credit Center for Venture Research program coordinator Laura Hill, who managed the many details of their project and their trip to New Mexico.

Having impressed environmental engineers at the WERC competition, TiltOne seeks to prove its business mettle at the upcoming Holloway Prize Innovation-to-Market Competition. It’s one of 15 start-ups competing in the semi-final round, the Bud Albin Challenge, tomorrow (April 25, 2014), and their sights are set squarely on the Championship Round May 7.

7 Comments

Excellent. I am glad youngsters are taking interest in innovations to solve complex problems. Due to diurnal motion of the Sun,tracking the solar panels to keep sun facing assumes importance. I am glad that these students found a solution. Earlier MIT researchers come out of Bio mimicry of Sunflower plant in designing sun tracking by solar panels. I was at World Hydrogen Energy Conference 2014,Gwangjo,Republic of Korea(June 15 to 20,2014) wherein in the Exhibition a Korean Student displayed Hydrogen bicycle.
Dr.A.Jagadeesh Nellore(AP),India

Hi Sam: I love contests and hands on stuff. In fact it is my preferred method. But they went far beyond when they start to incorporate financial and marketing aspects. At this level one MUST look at over all concept and design logic, not just for the learning and fun of it. Again, tracking energy is micro small compared to array yield. Now I am assuming that the one panel tracker in the background is just a show piece and not the "real animal", usually 6 to 20 panels per tracker. Given a one panel array, well then yes, but that is not what is usually installed as a grid tie system.

Seem pretty obvious that the the TiltOne advantage lies in the long-term view.

Mechanical issues (mounting, wind loading, tracking mechanisms, etc.) are all -- outside of simple maintenance -- fixed costs that happen once or periodically, as needed. Proper design (which is NOT always the cheapest or thinnest material despite what the CAD analysis might say BTW) can lessen the effects of these long term costs to a negligible level.

Not sure what Bill's getting at but the TiltOne design seems to me to be more efficient because it is harnessing the thermal energy for a useful purpose. The PV panels are already generating said thermal energy, or heat if you will. This heat is normally dissipated in some manner as a waste by-product of the solar process. A UNH innovation on the TiltOne system was to add TEGs into the dissipation path thus wringing out every last watt of useable energy; and then using it to assist in the auxiliary process aligning the panels for maximum output.

To summarize, TiltOne -- assuming the design team gets it right and the bean-counters aren't in charge ^_^ -- leverages one-time fixed costs to gain long-term, continuous improvement in the output of the system. Sounds like a winner to me.

To wit, Bill, contests like this are held to encourage people to think and innovate for themselves and their team, so to speak. Frankly, a refreshing change from the usual face-stuck-in-their-iPhone crowd I see wandering aimlessly from meal to meal. I say, bring on the contests ... and more like them!

A tracker increases the energy yield but also increases complexity and cost of the PV system and keeps the pay back period similar to a non-tracking system. a thermoelectric generator is more expensive than PV and needs high temperatures that will spoil the PV panel. the efficiency of the PV panel will be reduced if you try to exploit it's heat rather than dissipating it. What is the criteria of the judges? a drawing of the solar tracker solution will be helpful.
Falah

ANONYMOUS
May 14, 2014

I agree entirely with Bill. This is not a real world problem -only if tracking a tiny. System and then only probably on a dull day!

There was no mention of the efficiency of the TEGs. I doubt the TEGs would have a sensible pay-back period as the delta-T is not that great.

Far better to reduce the current use for existing tracking electronics or add a separate small
static panel! (See what I mean by not a good idea!)

I doubt that on a sensible sized system the tracking energy amounts to even 1% of the increase over a static system? Some data needed here to even justify whether a fix is needed or not?

Seems like a typical over-hyped marketing opportunity rather than an environmental waste saver.

Hi: The energy to move the panels to track the sun is insignificant compared to the system output. Heating for tracking systems is all ready less for tracking systems due to their better exposure to the wind and associated cooling (VS Roof). The biggest costs associated with mechanical tracking are the mechanical aspects (VS static). The extra energy gained by tracking makes the energy to track not even a factor (Way under 1%). Wind loadings are greater and wind challenges as a whole are more taxing. I am really not sure of the logic driving this contest....

.....Bill

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